M Train Shutdown: The North Brooklyn Subway Apocalypse Is Coming

We now know the MTA will shutdown L service ~forever~ (I mean, potentially three years or more is the same thing as forever), but just in case you were under the false impression that all other subway lines in north Brooklyn would remain fully operational, think again. Because the MTA, apparently, really likes to kick us while we’re down.

The Daily News reports that, in preparation for throngs of additional, re-routed commuters post L train apocalypse, the M train will be shutting down for a projected ten months, in order to give it fortifying repairs, and make it good and ready for all those sad, sad L commuters.

MTA Chair Tom Prendergast told the Daily News, “We want to get this work done and make sure the M has no issues of performance when the L work is going on.” The shutdowns will begin, potentially, as early as summer 2017. There is, however, one minuscule bright side: while L train shutdowns will affect 300,000 riders daily, M train disruption will merely affect 60,000 riders every day, so nbd. (JK, that’s still the size of a robust American city!)

M work will happen in two stages, says the Daily News: First, they need to strengthen a bridge extending over a rail yard near Myrtle Avenue; that will cause an entire-line shutdown from Myrtle Avenue to Middle Village-Metropolitan Avenue in Ridgewood, and the resulting closure will last two months. Next, the MTA will raze and re-construct a viaduct near Myrtle-Wyckoff, and that will require shuttle service between Myrtle-Wyckoff and the end of the line.

Furthermore, during the whole repair, approximately ten months, there will be no service between Knickerbocker and Central Avenues. To make up for that, trains will get a re-route to the J/Z between Myrtle and Broadway Junction.

“The L train—either the short or the long term shutdown—will require additional M service and additional J service,” said Prendergast. “This all has to be done by then.”